Irving, TX Accessory Structures: Garage Conversions (2026)

10, covering front-entry, side-entry, and rear-entry attached garages converted into habitable space. The building official will not issue a conversion permit unless every listed condition is met. Exterior materials, colors, and design on the converted wall must match the rest of the house's facade, so a mismatched addition gets rejected at review. Homes finished in wood siding must switch to a material with a wood appearance, such as vinyl or cementitious fiberboard, for the conversion wall; the code specifically bars using actual wood siding on the new work even where the rest of the house is wood.

Driveways and curb approaches serving the converted garage must be between sixteen and twenty-five feet wide, and if the existing driveway is narrower, wider, or not paved to the city's standard, the owner must repave the entire driveway from the street to the garage face. Access into the converted room must run through the interior of the house; a separate exterior door into the old garage bay is prohibited outright, and the section also bars turning the conversion into an independent dwelling unit, which keeps the change from becoming an unpermitted duplex or accessory apartment.

The rule only reaches conversions permitted after October 22, 2009, so older, already-completed conversions are not retroactively judged against these standards. Owners or their designees must still pull all required city permits and satisfy the building code, fire code, and energy efficiency standards that would apply to any other interior renovation. Irving amended this section repeatedly between 2023 and 2025, most recently in Ordinance 2025-11165, adopted August 28, 2025, folding the garage-conversion standard into broader development-code updates without loosening the material, driveway, or entry requirements.